Foreign News: Sparrow-Fall

Life is never easy, for the Scottish inhabitants of Fair Isle, that
rain-drenched pin point of an island in the Shetlands, north of
Scotland. Last week the dour-faced inhabitants, who make gaudy sweaters for golfers while they think about Death and the precepts of John
Knox, found life almost intolerable. A mysterious disease caused
thousands of sparrows to drop dead about the Fair Islanders as they sat
grimly at their knitting. No local scientist could explain why the
sparrows were falling.